Creatures Such as We

I can say confidently that Creatures Such As We is an elegant, intricate meta-narrative about player emotional investment and romancing non-player characters.
-Cara Ellison

[A]n incredibly engrossing tale of labour, life and loneliness in the future.
-Leigh Alexander

A wonderfully written, funny, truthful gem of a game, and a surprisingly lengthy one too.
-Tom Sykes

[T]here's just a lot of meaty interaction, together with a plot that keeps moving briskly along, some beautiful moonscape imagery, and a deft handling of inner and outer game plot.
-Emily Short

Creatures Such as We is a choice-based game (in a Choose Your Own Adventure style) written in ChoiceScript. It won second place in the 2014 Interactive Fiction Competition.

Creatures allows you to play as a moon-based tour director, who passes the time between duties by playing video games. The designers of your favorite game arrive as a tour group, and you get to not only discuss the disappointing ending, but the larger implications of video games as art as well.

The game is structurally a dating sim: players have the option to flirt with and romance their choice of NPC from the group of tourists (or choose to remain strictly professional). While each path follows the same general story line, the different NPC's have different dialogues, different concerns, different interests. I learned a lot on how to focus on compelling choice, and how to make choices and splits that feel important to the players.

Creatures was an experiment in character studies, and it was a lot of fun to create not only to create a fully-fleshed out setting, but to have a heavy focus on player interaction. I'm glad it turned out so well, and I'm excited to bring that experience to my next game.